A Young Versus an Old Creation: A Reconciliation?
D,W. Kupke
Department of Biochemistry School of Medicine
The
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, Virginia 22908

From: JASA 31(March 1979): 60-61

This controversy,
between those
who adhere to a literal six days for the Creation and those who accept the many
evidences for a very long prehistory, continues to divide Christians long after
the limitations of classical physics were recognized. In Genesis 1, the prophet
presented what seems to have become a paradox to modern man. He used a physical
clock to gauge the duration of the creative stages, yet this clock
(our sun) was
not even in existence during most of those stages. In effect, the
prophet's description
of the time span for the Creation was one of comparing the pace of a vast array
of prehistoric events with a later clock known to all mankind. That
these prehistoric
events transpired with extreme swiftness when compared to this clock
of the historical
period poses no paradox in 20thcentury physics. A difference in speeds during
the two eras relative to a reference position or a difference in gravitational
fields gives rise to clocks which run differently in the different
reference frames
(the slower clocks exhibiting "time dilation").

Time to mankind is essentially the apprehension of successive events (i.e., an
irreversible sequence called "time's arrow"), and we use
physical clocks
whose events seem the most periodic by which to gauge the pace of other events
(the periods, of course, are not precisely identical because all
clocks wear out).
We can discern no underlying and uniform time which is independent of physical
events-as Einstein and others pointed out when classical physics, embracing an
absolute time, seemed to be falling apart. The Genesis account
likewise does not
imply an absolute time dissociated from physical events. Time in
Genesis was clearly
and repeatedly described as the disappearance and re-appearance of
the sun. Moreover,
the account does not speak of disjointed,
a instantaneous appearances of created things; rather, it speaks of a
progression with an implied order and synchrony (e.g., "Let the
earth bring forth ). The Creation account reads as if the laws
governing the whole of Creation until now were installed and upheld by the Word
of God since the beginning.
For over fifty years there has been a succession of evidences
pointing to a beginning
for this universe (although the adherents of an eternal universe have
not really
given up). Light is now believed to have been a first event in the switching on
of these beginnings. Also, our sun is now believed to have appeared during the
last third or so of cosmic history (firm evidences on whether the
earth preceded
the sun, or vice versa, are not in hand). These findings are quite in
accord with
the prophet's assertions some thousands of years ago. Hence, we ought
to display
some confidence in the Genesis account by looking into time dilation
in the light
of astrophysical evidences; such dilation, as physicists understand the term,
seems to be precisely what the prophet was so insistent about. We need not look
far for significant clues and plausible mechanisms.

The popular interpretation of the observed red shift from radiations emitted in
the universe during prehistory asserts that the universe has been
expanding (reminiscent
of Isaiah 42:5 "Thus saith God, the Lord, who created the
heavens and stretched
them out"). It is now widely held that we are retreating from an
early stage
of the developing universe at virtually the speed of light. That is, the cosmic
background or black-body radiation now seen is related to that emitted long ago
at the decoupling stage of matter and radiation, and in our frame of reference,
we are departing from that era so fast that the wavelength of that radiation is
red shifted or stretched very far as it slowly catches up to us. The universe
is presumed to have been expanding before that era; thus, we could be extremely
close to the limiting speed of light relative to time zero. By this
picture, time
(i.e., events) could be greatly dilated (slowed) in the historical period (or
the beginning of it) when compared to the pace of events during
prehistory. (This
follows because dilation amounts to very little until the speed of
light is closely
approached and provided also that we assume the
expansion of matter achieved such close approach at about the dawn of
man.) Even
if a slowdown in the expansion has occurred, as some theories require, it may
have taken place after mankind appeared. Alternatively, if we assume with Fred
Hoyle that the red shift refers to an increase in mass with time (events) since
the beginning when mass may have been zero, a gravitational stretching of time
becomes plausible.

Any such scenario, however, is worth very little, being no less optional than
are cosmological theories generally. The important point, aside from the fact
that observations have been becoming more and more compatible to
dilation schemes,
is that the six-day time span can no longer be said to be disproved.
It is highly
unlikely that clear proof, one way or the other, will ever appear. Although the
prophet's comparison of prehistoric clocks with the later clock would seem to
be potentially testable, the increasing opaqueness of the universe
with look-back
time into prehistory ultimately becomes insurmountable (owing in part
to the finite
speed of light). Even the expansion itself is merely a useful paradigm and not
at all proved. In a word, physical absolutes are unattainable to
physical observers.

The time problem found with Genesis after the scientific revolution
got underway
need not have divided us beyond the point when Newton's assumption of
an infinite
speed for light was disproved almost a century ago. Indeed, the
nearly concurrent
discovery of radioactivity, which was used immediately to settle the great time
debate of the 19th century in favor of a very old Creation, was not
applied equally
the other way. These same discoveries ushered in the measurements
which demonstrated
that time to us is not uniform under different conditions and,
therefore, we ought
not continue to suppose that all of prehistory remains precisely in
the same frame
of reference to any observer in any era. We now realize, given the
prophet's clock
comparison, that an observer living during prehistory would have noted no speed
up of events; all things, including his own reactions, would have
been proceeding
normally and in synchrony just as they do today. But, if the same
kind of clocks
from these two eras (e.g., atomic or radioactive ones) could be compared side
by side, the later ones should be running extremely slowly compared
to the prehistoric
ones according to Genesis I. Thus, radioactive clocks and other kinds
of evidences
supporting a vast history for the universe in terms of sequential
events are fully
compatible with the six literal (sun-to-sun) days in Genesis for the total span
of prehistory. Those arguing for a young Creation, then, need not
feel threatened
as evidences continue to mount which point to billions of years worth of events
during prehistory (according to our slow clocks), nor need they
embrace such extensions
to Scripture as created oldness, instant vegetation etc. On the other
side, there
is no need for those eschewing the literal six days to supply various
ad hoc explanations
such as long gaps between the days, revelatory time, poetic time or
equating the
"days" with eons of time. These, understandably, were
designed to preserve
the Bible's credibility in the fate of overwhelming evidences against
the 6 days
on the basis of Newton's uniform time postulate - a postulate which, somehow,
remains a mindset to the large majority of the intellectual
community, scientists
included. It is really those on the outside who fan this and other
controversies
among us by applying the 19thcentury view of absolute space, time, matter and
motion.

The theologian and historian might help us to understand the purpose
of including
in Genesis this strange time span - a seemingly unnecessary message which has
so bedeviled the contemporary community of believers. As scientists, however,
we might dwell on how astonishing it is that an author several thousand years
ago should have compared the pact of physical events with a clock
which ran differently
- a property of nature which awaited discovery until the 20th century.